


greater yearning

by depugnare



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Domestic, F/M, M/M, Multi, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Series, because this is my town now, i changed a few things sorry they deserve a soft epilogue, silvermadiflinthamilton near the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 20:05:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17250536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/depugnare/pseuds/depugnare
Summary: Silver comes home on a Tuesday.





	greater yearning

**Author's Note:**

> sorry for the format...i don't know why it adds all that space when I copy and paste from google docs, but I am too lazy to fix it.

It’s winter when Silver looks at him, bloodied and exhausted, and asks if he would be enough if this war ended. Flint looks back at him, equally bloodied and exhausted, and doesn’t answer.

 

How can Silver ask him that?

 

Would he be enough? Flint isn’t even sure the _war_ is enough. Thinks that it’s nothing compared to this thing that’s wrapped around the two of them. Something soft-bellied and unspoken that has no place in the middle of the war.

 

But after?

 

That is where Flint falters. What is left after this? There is no home to return to. No Miranda. No Thomas. No one who will feel satisfied in taking revenge with him. He is the only one left who even remembers why he’s done the terrible things he has for the past decade. The only one left who remembers their smiles and their laughter and that they were once alive.

 

So Flint says yes.

 

Silver looks startled at that, eyes going wide, and Flint yanks him forward to hold him close and breathe in the sent of gunpowder and salt clinging to his hair. Feels Silver’s arm slowly come up around him to return the embrace and Flint is reminded of another young man, scared and unsure in the dark, and he smiles against Silver’s hair.

 

“I have a secret,” Silver whispers, hands trembling against Flint’s back.

 

It is a terrible secret. One that makes Flint want to howl in rage enough to bring on another storm. Pushes away from Silver who looks up at him with those knowing blue eyes and Flint is caught by them.

 

“I lied to protect you,” Silver murmurs. “And him.”

 

His rage quiets immediately, heart startled by the admission.

 

“No one knows,” Silver says. “No one but me. I killed the man who told me where he was. Thomas Hamilton is safe from this war while he remains dead. Rogers cannot know that he is alive, nor can you give any indication of it by going after him. They will take him, they will use him against you, and then they will kill him.”

 

Flint clenches his fists, lip curling in a snarl, and Silver accepts this reaction with that awful, stony patience of his that means he knows exactly how Flint is feeling. Flint _knows_ that he knows, the two of them always having been alike in their rage over the pain of a loved one.

 

They both glance at the pistol in Silver’s hand and then back up at each other.

 

“If you’re dead, you’re free to go to him,” Silver says.

 

Flint clenches his jaw, hand flexing even though there’s no blade for him to grab. No desire to curl his fingers into a fist.

 

“She’ll hate you for it,” he says and Silver nods.

 

“I know.”

 

“ _I’ll_ hate you for it,” Flint says, softer this time.

 

“I know.”

 

Silver sets his jaw, stubborn even as his hand shakes. Flint loves him so much he could die from it.

 

“Then kill me,” Flint says. “Let everyone know that Long John Silver killed Captain Flint.”

 

_Let everyone know that you were enough._

 

Silver raises his pistol into the air and fires a single shot.

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

Thomas waits.

 

He never used to be good at this sort of thing. It’s just one of the things he and his father used to clash over all the time. His father could wait for an eternity for the exact moment to strike, a snake with a well-aimed bite. Thomas was more like a battering ram, insistent and loud and impatient until he broke down whatever barrier was keeping him from what he wanted to accomplish.

 

A stubborn ass is what Miranda used to call him.

 

But now he waits, because something like this requires patience. Sits in his chair sipping at his tea as he watches James sew a pair of his trousers by candlelight. His eyes squint in the dim light, spectacles borrowed from Thomas dangerously close to falling off his nose. Thomas gets up and brings another candle, holding it up so he can see.

 

“You could finish those in the morning you know,” he says and is greeted by a noncommittal grunt.

 

James is so quiet these days, Thomas nearly forgets he’s the same brash man who strode into his life and turned everything upside down. He leans down and takes the needle from his hand and James scowls up at him. Thomas gives him a look and James sighs, leaning back into the cushions.

 

They don’t fight these days. Thomas is far too patient and James is far too quiet, so now they sigh back and forth until one of them herds the other into bed and they go to sleep curled together.

 

“Save this for the morning,” Thomas says again. “It will be there when we wake up. Let’s go to bed.”  
  
He holds out his free hand and James puts his in it, their callouses catching against each other. Thomas’ hand is spotted from the sun and Flint’s is criss-crossed with scars that make his hands look carved from wood. They’re an unfamiliar pair these days, but a pair nonetheless.

 

Thomas waits.

 

“Alright,” says James, standing up to follow him.

 

“He’ll come tomorrow,” Thomas says simply. “I know it.”

 

“You’ve said that for three years now,” James says to him and Thomas squeezes his hand.

 

“I know,” Thomas says. “And as you know, every day after the current one is a tomorrow, so I haven’t been wrong, it just simply wasn’t the right tomorrow.”

 

Flint makes an outraged noise and Thomas smiles over his shoulder at him. Takes in that sun weathered face and those green eyes he’s always loved and feels his heart flutter like it did when they first met.

 

“Tomorrow I’m going to meet this man you’re so in love with,” Thomas says knowingly. “I can feel it in my bones.”

 

James always looks guilty at that but Thomas had long ago accepted that his James was always going to be somebody else’s too. James simply had too much love in him to give to just one person.

 

“That’s just your arthritis,” James teases and Thomas tugs him close, pressing him up against the wall before bracketing with his arms.

 

“No,” Thomas says. “This is a different ache. One that you won’t share with me but I feel anyways. You love him and you miss him and I say that tomorrow he will come back to you. Everything will be alright.”

 

James closes his eyes and leans forward, resting his head against Thomas’ shoulder. Thomas can feel him trembling and he makes a soft noise, wrapping his arms around him. James has always been so unsure in love, even though he felt it more deeply than anyone Thomas knew.

 

Anyone alive. Miranda had felt love like that, gut wrenching and all consuming, and she’d burned so bright with it that Thomas had hardly been able to look at her some days. She was like sunlight, walking from room to room in that dreadful house and suddenly there had been James alongside her and it seemed that the shadow of his father could finally be chased away.

 

Now Thomas knows that it was an enormous burden, their love, and that he should have protected them better than he had.

 

“I wouldn’t lie to you,” Thomas murmurs, pressing a kiss to Flint’s temple. “Not again.”

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

There is a door in Silver’s dreams that he cannot open.

 

Painted red with a knocker shaped like a bird.

 

He tells Madi about this door and she looks at him with her sharp, knowing eyes and tells him that it’s his heart before turning back to her books. She hadn’t ignored him this time, which means she’s slowly getting better from the damage he did.

 

She loves him, but she does not trust him.

 

Not even after he told her the truth. That he had aimed at the sky and not Flint’s heart.

 

He gave her a war and it was not enough, _he_ was not enough, and so now they sat here in a parlor of a stolen house on an island lost to everyone that had ever claimed power over it, waiting for a letter that never arrives.

 

“You will have to go to him,” Madi says, making notes in her journal as she reads. “He will not bring Thomas near this place without you at his side.”

 

“And you?” Silver asks and she looks up at him.

 

“I will wait,” she says simply, as though he should already know this. “But if you do not go soon I will move out of this house. I cannot bear your wandering around as though you are missing half your soul.”

 

Silver nods. He knows she’s right. She usually is these days.

 

It’s terrifying, to think of finding Flint and bringing him home. To show him an island that is not what they were striving for but has become a home just the same. To show him that Silver was not able to give anyone what they wanted, except for Madi who now sits bundled up in a chair that she’d been eyeing for months at the shop.

 

Never let it be said that, while Silver doesn’t know where the cache is, he’s ever out of money. Had hidden what little pay he got beneath the floorboards of an abandoned house, and now that money sits beneath the floor of his own house.

 

“What if he doesn’t want to see me?” he asks and Madi finally sets down her quill and comes over to him. Settles down in his lap so she can cup his face and force him to look into her eyes.

 

“John Silver, you are the stupidest man I know,” she says. “Anyone who loves you would want to see you. It’s maddening, how much we do.”

 

“Oh,” Silver says softly and Madi rolls her eyes.

 

“Honestly, all that intelligence and not a bit of sense in you.”

 

Silver’s brow knits together as he thinks and Madi takes his hand in hers, thumb gently stroking his knuckles. It had taken them so long to fall back into their easy affection that every single one of her touches still takes Silver by surprise.

 

“He loves you,” Madi murmurs. “I know it. I could see it on his face every time he looked at you and I could not even fault him that. Just as I cannot fault you for loving him back.”  
  
Silver’s breath catches in his throat and he buries his face against her shoulder.

 

“I don’t deserve you,” he says and she tugs on a lock of his hair again.

 

“Like I said, not a bit of sense in you.”

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

They wake up at the same time on the day they meet again.

 

Pre-dawn, the time when a captain and quartermaster rise to start their day. The sailor’s hour.

 

Silver takes a bath before he does anything else, paying extra for the luxury of hot water. It’s too cold for cold water, winter an actual season here instead of the hazy memory it is in Nassau. Soaks until the water starts to turn lukewarm and then combs his hair until it’s neat and shiny. Feels like an idiot as he buttons up a soft, blue shirt that Madi said compliments his eyes, but he doesn’t want to look anything like the last time Flint saw him. Certainly doesn’t want Former _Lord_ Thomas Hamilton to think he’s some scruffy looking vagrant.

 

He goes down the stairs of the dockside inn and charms a biscuit from the matronly cook before he makes his way out onto the streets. Flint and Thomas live in a neighborhood only a few streets over, though he supposes Flint will be furious when he finds out how easy it was for Silver to find him.

 

The streets are quiet this early in the morning, only the bakeries and other businesses showing any signs of life as they open their doors and sweep before customers arrive. Many of them don’t even give Silver a second glance and Silver finds that he likes that about busy port towns. He’s not the first sailor missing a leg that they’ve seen and towns like these all have a similar frantic, bustling energy that leave no time to gawk or waste time.

 

However, this means that all too soon he’s at the address his man told him that Flint and Thomas were to be found at. It’s not a particularly nice house, wedged as it is between a bookstore and a haberdashery, but the paint on the door is fresh and the stoop is tidy and one would never think that a once terrifying pirate captain and the disgraced son of a former lord lived there, in a house with a vase of flowers in the window.

 

He can’t help the flutter in his heart as he raises his hand and curls it into a fist, hesitating for just a moment before he raps his knuckles against the door. He gets no response, only the quiet sound of the shopkeepers sweeping on either side of him, and thinks that perhaps it’s too early.

 

But no, Flint has always risen at this hour no matter how tired he was, years of being in the navy still clinging to him in the form of habits and posture. Sure enough, Silver hears footsteps inside and the quick slide of a lock before the door opens.

 

At once he does not recognize the man in front of him, yet he’d know that face anywhere. Has dreamed of it a thousand times. Flint’s hair is soft and long, pulled back away from his face, which hosts a much more neatly trimmed beard than the last time Silver saw him.

 

He does not expect that sharp mouth of Flint’s to curve into a gentle smile. For those scarred, weathered hands to reach out and pull him into an embrace that leaves him gasping for breath. For Flint to pull him inside, into the safety of his home, and shut the door so he can wrap his arms around Silver and bury his face in his hair.

 

“Thomas said you would come,” Flint murmurs. “I should have known, he’s always right these days.”

 

“So is Madi,” Silver says, embarrassed at how raw his voice sounds.

 

Flint laughs at that and it’s the best sound Silver has ever heard in his life. Feels Flint give him one last squeeze before he steps back to look at him, hands never leaving Silver’s shoulders. It feels strange to be standing here and not have Flint furious with him, but Silver isn’t sure if he prefers the tender look on his face or not.

 

“How did you find us?” Flint asks.

 

It would be so easy for Silver to lie. He’s decided that there’s been enough of that between them and he takes a deep breath before he tells the truth.

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

Flint can hardly believe it.

 

Here Silver is, whole and alive, and looking a fair sight better than the last time he saw him. His hair is clean and glossy, neatly tied back and not quite so long as it used to be. He seems more settled, posture easy and confident instead of the huddled, frantic pose he’d held during those last few days together, secrets and responsibility weighing him down physically and mentally.

 

Silver stands in front of him looking nearly respectable and tells him how he found them. How he had a man track them down and report back to him and Flint could throttle him it makes him so angry.

 

He doesn’t though. Doesn’t even have the energy or the desire to be angry with Silver, too relieved to see him to feel anything else. Reaches out to take his hand, thumb brushing over the knuckles before he carefully lifts it to his mouth and kisses his palm like something holy.

 

“You came back to me,” Flint says softly.

 

Silver gives him a soft, sad look, hand flexing in his hold. His eyes search Flint’s face for something, body trembling, and Flint simply leans forward to rest his forehead against Silver’s.

 

“I’m not angry with you,” Flint says and Silver makes a sound like a sob. “Not anymore. And I heard you gave Madi Nassau. Gave her a chance to do what she wants in her own time.”

 

Silver nods, tilting his head up just a bit to press his nose against Flint’s. His lips brush against Flint’s and Flint gasps, chest shuddering as he struggles for breath.

 

“Can I?” he asks and Silver nods frantically, hands fisting in his shirt to keep him close.

 

Flint leans forward just a bit, never knowing such a small distance to feel so vast, and presses his lips against Silver’s.

 

They’re soft.

 

So soft and warm, Flint melts against him and Silver wraps his arms around him. They stumble backwards until they’re leaning against the wall, still clutching each other. Kiss and kiss until they have to pull back to breathe and even then they stay close enough for their lips to brush together every time they move.

 

“You’re really good at that,” Silver says and Flint laughs, nosing his cheek.

 

“Did you think I would be bad?” he asks and Silver shrugs.

 

“I thought-” he starts, and falls silent. Looks up at Flint with a sad, vulnerable expression that makes Flint sigh.

 

“That I would reject you? Why would I have asked to kiss you if I was going to do that?”

 

“You have every right to,” Silver murmurs. “And I would not blame you if you did.”

 

“I was angry,” Flint says softly. “But I am also tired of losing people I love. First you return Thomas to me and now I have you here. Now the only one missing is Miranda to come through that door, scolding me for denying myself.”

 

“I can’t give you Miranda,” Silver says sadly. “But I can agree that you shouldn’t deny yourself anything.”  
  
“Then stay,” Flint says, smiling. “Even if it’s just for a little while. I’ll make us something to eat.”

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

Thomas has not woken up before dawn since Flint arrived at the plantation with money and a key.

 

Today is no exception.

 

The sun is streaming through the window of their second floor bedroom when Thomas wakes to a strange thumping sound from downstairs. At first he thinks it’s the sound of his own heart in his ears, but then as he wakes up more the sound becomes recognizable as wood against wood. He gets up and grabs his robe, wondering what James would be working on at such an ungodly hour.

 

What he finds at the bottom of the stairs is a man with dark, curly hair  and a crutch tucked under one arm.

 

“Oh,” he says, looking at the man. “I didn’t think I’d actually be right this time.”

 

The man looks back at him, tilting his head up to look at Thomas’ face.

 

“Fuck’s sake, thought I’d seen the last of tall blondes with Billy Bones,” he grumbles as he makes his way forward, sticking out his hand.

 

“John Silver, nice to mee-”

 

He stops when Thomas grabs his hand and pulls him forward, leaning down to look at his face.

 

“Those eyes,” Thomas says, studying them. “So blue! And here I thought James was exaggerating.”

 

Silver blinks, looking confused, and Thomas finds it makes him look younger than he is. Or perhaps Silver _is_ young, he’s just been aged by suffering. Thomas can relate.

 

“Handsome,” he says, circling him. “Though shorter than I expected. The way he described you...I was expecting someone ten feet tall.”

 

“Sorry to disappoint,” Silver says dryly and Thomas laughs. It’s a noise that makes James appear from the other room, curious as always.

 

“There you are,” Thomas says. “I was wondering what you were doing up so early and came downstairs find your wayward quartermaster in our foyer.”

 

“We don’t have a foyer,” Flint grumbles, coming over to stand between the two of them. “Thomas, this is John Silver.”

 

“I’m quite aware,” Thomas says. Reaches out to gentle press his thumb against his swollen, red bottom lip. “You’ve been kissing I see. Did I miss the dramatic reunion? You should have come to get me.”

 

“You’re still the nosiest hen in the neighborhood,” James mutters, leaning forward to fix the collar of Thomas’ robe. “Never was one to miss a bit of drama.”

 

“If I was, I never would have kissed you all those years ago,” Thomas hums, leaning down to give him a soft kiss on the cheek. “And where would we be now? Probably dead in a ditch somewhere anyways. It’s not like you weren’t father’s most convenient excuse to get rid of me.”

 

Silver looks startled by that and Thomas can’t help but grin. Flint gives him a warning look. He gives him a look back, not cowed in the slightest. He’s going to tease Silver, just a bit. Can’t let him arrive at their home so early and yet three years late without any sort of consequence. Can’t help but want to see what kind of man it is that James has fallen in love with.

 

“John,” he says, “Have you ever heard the story of how James and I met?”

 

“Oh, here we go,” James says, rolling his eyes as he walks back to the kitchen. “Don’t mind if I don’t stick around to listen to you butcher the story, _my lord_.”

 

“Flint,” Silver hisses, watching him leave. “Flint don’t leave me here!”

 

He turns back to Thomas once James has left the room, looking like he’s being marched to the gallows.

 

“As I was saying,” Thomas begins again, “One day, I was on the steps of Parliament-”

 

-

 

-

 

-

 

Silver comes home on a Tuesday.

 

Madi knows the moment he returns to the island, something inside her settling. A yearning for him that she hadn’t quite known how to tame, still surprised how nervous and eager he makes her after all these years.

 

She turns to her mother, quietly knitting in the rocking chair next to her, and her mother smiles when she looks up to meet her eyes.

 

“Has he returned?” she asks and Madi nods. “I suppose he _does_ live here, there’s nothing I can do about it.”

 

“You like him,” Madi says, getting up and setting her paperwork aside. “I know that much. You both sit out here and drink your tea together in the morning.”

 

Her mother huffs and waves her hand and Madi slips on her shoes to go out into the front yard to wait. Walks through the carefully tended garden full of sweet smelling flowers that Silver had planted for her birthday. Trails her fingers over their soft, bright petals as she makes her way to the gate, tilting her face up to feel the sun.

 

It’s not long before she hears the clattering sound of a wagon approaching and she leans over the gate to see a wagon with three figures in it approaching. She opens the gate and steps out, waving as she does. The shortest figure waves back and she smiles.

 

They’re in front of the gate in less than minute and she looks up at them, hardly recognizing the red-haired man sitting next to Silver in the front.

 

“James,” she breathes, opening her arms when he hops down from the wagon. Folds him into her arms when he rushes forward, burying her face in his chest.

 

“Princess,” he murmurs, wrapping his arms around her.

 

“Queen,” she corrects, looking up at him. Reaches up to tug on his neat little ponytail.

 

“John should have told you that.”

 

“He did,” Flint says. “And about everything else. But I’m afraid to me you will always be the princess standing on the aftdeck of my ship like it belonged to her.”

 

“And you will always be the captain who thought himself a king on my island,” she huffs, smiling when Flint smiles at her.

 

She turns then to Silver, who comes forward to cup her face, resting his forehead against hers. His eyes crinkle when he smiles in the way that she loves and she tilts her chin up to press a kiss to his lips.

 

“You found him,” she says softly and he nods.

 

“I did. Both of them.”

 

That’s right. Madi turns in Silver’s arms to look at the third man making his way down from the wagon. He carries himself in a way that suggests higher breeding, shoulders back and jaw high, but his eyes are kind and his hands are as calloused and scarred as any farmer. She steps out of Silver’s arms and curtsies to him.

 

He bends at the waist in a perfect bow, reaching out to take one of her hands and gently presses a kiss to her knuckles. Then he tugs her a bit closer to peer at her face.

 

“My apologies your majesty,” he says softly, studying her with blue eyes. Lighter than Silver’s. Soft, like rain. “But I don’t see so well these days. I’m working on getting a pair of glasses, but you see, James doesn’t like how they look on me.”

 

“That’s a lie and you know it,” Flint says from beside him and Madi startles herself by giggling.

 

Flint reaches into his vest and holds out a pair of spectacles, which Thomas takes with a flourish and sets on his nose. He leans back and Madi looks up.

 

“Well, you’re a tall that's for sure. Tell me, do you feel the sun up there more my lord?” she says and she can hear Silver stifle a laugh behind her.

 

“You truly are John's wife” Thomas says, grinning. “But to answer your question, no. You see, most times I have a hat on like a respectable gentleman. Unlike these two scoundrels.”

 

Madi turns to Silver, who just shakes his head, unable to help a smile from creeping across his face. He looks settled in a way he’s never been, lacking the frantic energy he’s always seemed to have, as though looking for something he cannot find. Watches Flint come over to him and take his hand and feels her heart swell in her chest.

 

She walks forward to put her hand over their clasped ones, feeling peace settle over her when they both look up and smile at her.

 

“I told you,” she says to Silver. “Anyone who loves you will not be able to bear not seeing you.”

 

“Are you saying you missed me?” he teases, leaning forward to kiss her. She lets him, once, before stepping back.

 

“I’m saying welcome home.”

 

And for the first time, she means it.


End file.
